What exactly is noteworthy about this? Bush was perpetually compared to satan, the anti-christ, Hitler, etc... but oh no! some drunk young punks disrespected Obama - it's a tragic statement on an entire country. I sure hope Obama isn't as thin skinned and as easily butt hurt as his followers. Nut up, for pete's sake.
@armeck: wait -- did you just seriously compare "calling bush satan" (which wasn't really a common thing?) to screaming out "faggots" and "niggers"? because that's really fucked up, if that's what you meant to say!
I don't get why people are excusing this by saying "oh, the kids are young." I don't care if they're 13 years old, it's never OK to say shit like that. Racism isn't an adorable phase every kid goes through, like some kind of ideological puberty.
The fact that they're Americans reminds me of a friend I had from Liberia (who was black). He said he fucking hated black tourists from the US who kept talking about Liberia and Africa as the "homeland," and how paternalistic they got about this country they'd just arrived in. Whereas white tourists in Liberia knew that they were merely tourists, and consequently comported themselves in such a way that recognized their own otherness. In this video, these kids are assuming a patriotic fervor for a country they're only scratching the surface of, before they go back to their comfy lives in Westchester or Silver Spring. They're just as arrogant and unrealistic as those black tourists to Liberia are, figuring they know best when it comes to a country they don't even know at all.
I made the mistake of reading the post (and link) and comments before actually viewing the video. My nana's (Ashkenazi) Jewish, and as an (otherwise) brown person, I was really feeling some conflicted emotion about what it really means to be a brown Jew.
Then I actually watched the video. Those dudes cannot possibly be the educated class of Israel. I feel a little bad that I can't feel genuine horror, as much as amused disregard.
Let me unretire from this post to make a few observations.
1) I didn't know that pointing to the racism of other people made one an anti-semite. But, apparently under some conditions, that is the case. Good to know.
2) Likewise I didn't know that pointing a camera at a bunch of drunken assholes and asking their opinion about the President and his policy toward one country made one a self-hating Jew and an anti-semite. I shall alert my friends.
3) I really need to know what specific brands of alcohol (and/or drugs) cause one to talk about niggers and faggots, advocate the assassination of a sitting president, etc. You might also want to pry these magical elixirs from the hands of these kids' parents, because these are learned attitudes.
4) Okay, so you convinced me, I don't really give a shit about dual citizenship. What I would like, however, and what I haven't had in my lifetime, is a foreign policy in the middle east that puts the United States' interests first. Maybe we'll get it now (although until yesterday, nothing Obama ever said made me think this was the case).
5) When I suggested that these kids should have to choose their citizenship, I never imagined for a second that they would choose the Israeli option. I don't blame them; and no matter, we share our country with all manner of cretins...even ones from Crete.
6) The accusation of anti-semitism is ridiculously overused. Quick quiz: who are the other "Semites" in the region? Quick answer: the Arabs. But you know an Internet discussion has lost its intellectual spark when the old saw comes out.
@Mediahohoho: If Nos. 1 and 2 on your list really surprised you, you need to go back and re-read The Handbook For Avoiding Intellectually Honest Debate About Israel Policy by Alan Dershowitz. I know I'm repeating my comment above, but I really feel like he's the Sergeant-at-Arms of the club that makes this bullshit the default setting for more than a few people when discussing this topic. It's so fucking infuriating that someone so smart will engage is discussions like:
"Perhaps a missile attack was an over-reaction on Israel's part."
"From what page of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion did you pull that from?!?!?!"
What's the difference between these guys and black or latino, or Muslim kids or poor rural white southerners acting up and spewing nonsense of in front of the camera?
They're negative behavior would immediately attributed to an entire race or group of people.
I can appreciate that these jerks in the video are not representative of every single person who happens to be Jewish. I doubt many, many of these same posters would agree and come to the defense of the kids if they were from Queens or Pilsen or East LA, Youngstown, Ohio, or Iran.
Slick meida play. Anybody who fears Obama's Mideast policy (with its tilt away from Israel), is now a racist, a drunk, a nutjob. Then again, that's how the American media portrayed the election. If you criticized Obama, you were a racist, an ignoramous, unenlightened, etc.
@hatchetman: They were not criticizing Obama. They were calling him a nigger and advocating for his assassination. These comments are amazing. Yes, these were drunken idiots who probably do not represent the majority of Israelis or American Jews. But to say that you cannot post this because it will encourage anti-semitism is turning a blind eye just because the subject matter is uncomfortable. People are acting like there is no history of friction and animosity between Jewish and black communities. Would people here be so willing to rationalize away this type of behavior if they were not Jews? There is a difference between putting things into context and completely dismissing the underlining attitudes and sentiments expressed in this video.
@heywhat: Exactly. I can't believe people aren't more pissed off about this. I am utterly shocked. Not because I think this paints an entire religion: but the defensiveness of the comments. Racism is wrong y'all.
Sooo... the idea here was to go find the drunkest college students possible and then make fun of them for not making the most coherent political points?
@Almostbanned: There's a big, huge gap between "coherent political points" and "virulent racism, overtly expressed," AB.
There are a lot of obstacles on the path between those two points -- or so one hopes -- and three rounds of drinks don't suddenly enable one to make the whole journey in one night. In fact I'd suggest it takes years of training.
That's what's so unsettling about this video, even if the words wind up being completely empty: That these kids posit the existence of a community where saying such things out loud isn't the social equivalent of immediately dunking yourself in shit and being set on fire.
For some groups, we think we know why they say such things and where their ideas come from. For this group, however, the sources of their behavior are somewhat less clear to many of us, and that's why it's unsettling.
To anyone has a handle on why these kids think it's OK to act this way: I understand why your reaction is "Come on, it's not that big a deal, it's really no different than any other group of kids who would say such things. You're blowing it out of proportion." I think you're probably right. I just suggest that we who are stunned by this are stunned because we're confused and unsettled, not because we think these kids are representative of anyone but themselves and the (hopefully imaginary) community where they think such utterances are fair game.
@Novaload Misses Murilee: as a southerner, i definitely agree with you that my region is not the only racist place in the united states, but i will also say that we in the south have a different relationship with racism, due to the precise reason that the south is considered the racist region. we talk about racism and race a lot, both from an introspective point of view, and then also because there still are a lot of casual racists running around down here. we still have to talk about the civil war and should we fly the stars and bars over state capitol buildings, we still have lynchings ever so often, there are still racist policies passed by local governments. the conversation is widely acknowledged to an extent, and, in a lot of ways, i appreciate living in the south and being able to exist in this context and trying to work across these lines. and the stereotypes about the south, well, some other them are still unfortunately true.
Way to throw the door open to antisemites. No, I'm not talking about people who are critical of Israel, as they should be. I mean not asshats who say things like "We should all just feel so blessed for the eternal gift Judaism -- who knew that an ancient dogma dogma rooted in self-obsession and exploitation would lead to such nuanced and intelligent behavior?"
Or "The funny thing about these people is they have no problem invoking the Holocaust." Yes, Gawker, you encourage these troll jackasses, and their sentiments will now be embraced by your servers forever.
How is it that this site can find douchebags anywhere -- heck, that's what it does best -- but only manages to generalize them all as something like "The Young Jews" in, oh, certain cases?
This sort of thing came up throughout the election, when Jews as a whole were constantly being "jokingly" ridiculed on this site as Obama-hating racists. The fact is, and remains, that 78 percent of American Jews voted for Obama, versus 43 percent of whites in general. 78 percent. But you find a few racist douchenozzles getting drunk and and mouthing off in a disgusting manner, and suddenly "The Young Jews Are Not Fans of Obama."
Fuck these assholes? Yes, I agree. But fuck you, too, Gawker. Just fuck you.
@TedSez: Ted, I ask you to consider the possibility that, while the video can be startling and can probably throw people off their game for a day or two, no substantive contributor to the Gawker community is going to form an opinion about a community as diverse as American or Israeli Jews based on the utterances of a few obviously ill-prepared souls.
I think everyone -- even the lurking anti-semites, who I can't deny are probably out there somewhere -- recognizes this behavior for what it is: extremely poor judgment by folks who aren't operating at their highest level. We've all seen that happen in our own lives, multiple times in fact, and we're just thankful there weren't cameras around then.
@TedSez: Ted, I'd have posted this video if it were Catholics from the New Orleans area like myself in it, just so you know. I just think it helps to remind us all how far we still have to go. But I can see how maybe using "The Young Jews" could be viewed as generalizing, which wasn't what I was trying to do---it was merely an extension of "The Jews" meme that has existed around here for a long time. I'll consider changing "the" to "some" though, because I think your point has some validity.
And the commenter who made that "eternal gift" comment...I just banned him about 5 minutes ago as I made my way through this thread. First one ever and certainly very deserved.
@skahammer: Yep. It's a bunch of drunk little boys trying to outdo each other for the shiny cameras. They probably remembered a much tamer session when they finished vomiting the next morning. And a good number of them are going to wake up tomorrow to fiery-hot inboxes where their relatives are going to take them down about a million pegs (for public drunkeness, if not the cursing, if not the politics).
@skahammer: But that still begs the question of why this is being posted as if it were a searing expose of the sentiments of young Jews about Obama, when it's just a handful of drunken, not particularly bright college kids mouthing off. Anyone who spends five minutes on the Internet knows there are people out there of every creed, color, age, and station who don't like Obama. This is being represented as if it said something meaningful and new about a particular group of people. It's at best drama-mongering and at worst inflammatory.
@MissNormaDesmond: But that still begs the question of why this is being posted
I'm not sure it does, actually -- I find an assertion like "X begs the question" hard to interpret.
But here's my attempt anyway: Such overt expressions of racism are worth shining a light on, and denouncing, in contexts where they're not already cliches.
I'd say that among groups of Americans abroad, this behavior is not a cliche and thus is pretty shocking. In the expatriate groups I've encountered, there might be one or two loudmouths willing to utter such sentiments, but they know that they're acting against group norms and usually wind up acknowledging that social pressure.
That's my brief attempt to describe why this video feels sui generis and shocking enough to be of note -- which could be the "why" you asked about.
Possibly you could counter me by arguing that these kids' shocking utterances don't really have any content and aren't even "meant" in any significant sense. I'd listen to that argument, if you thought you had some insight into what makes these kids act this way. On that topic, I've got nothing.
@The Cajun Boy: I understand that my fit of pique may have seemed directed at you, and I apologize for that. I don't think you were wrong to publish the video -- I would have done it myself in your place.
But I have felt for a long time that Gawker has a thing about "The Jews" -- something that may seem intended as sophisticated mockery against a group that can take it, but happens so often that it seems generally meanspirited and to come from a bad place. And the reappearance of genuinely bigoted trolls is an indication that they're going to a bad place, too.
Usually when I see these posts I just tell myself to shut up and move on, but the headline on this post (which was by no means the worst of the genre) just got to me. And I appreciate you changing it.
I do think the meme Gawker ran with throughout the election period, of "old Jews / young Jews / all Jews hate Obama because they're secret racists and because he might not love Israel enough, and those Jews maybe have too much power and could ruin the 'hope and change' thing for the rest of us," is not just hateful but untrue, and has to stop. I mean, 78 percent support. Sheesh.
@skahammer: Sorry, you're right, I didn't express myself clearly. What I meant was that it seems to be taken for granted that this is worth posting as news, but I think that bears examining.
It seems to me, and the original headline and the overhyped rhetoric of the journalist who shot the video would seem to support this, that what supposedly made this so shocking is that these are Jewish kids in Israel. That's pretty much it. Otherwise it's just a bunch of stupid college kids ranting, which would hardly seem to merit that much attention. Maybe they're representative of a much larger group, but this video does nothing to demonstrate that -- it's eight people, most of whom seem to know one another, but suddenly we're supposed to be outraged and horrified by what they say because -- why? Sure, they're saying stupid obnoxious things, but after everything that was seen in the last election, are we really surprised by seeing obviously stupid people say obnoxious things about Obama? When they're drunk? Really?
This just seems like an utter non-event to me that got attention solely due to the religion/ethnicity of the people who said it. It's the crappiest kind of bogus trend-story reporting. I could see posting it to make fun of the original poster before being shocked and outraged by the content.
I mean, if this is that newsworthy, I think Gawker should also be trawling Youtube on a weekly basis to post the best of morons on the Internet.
This is sort of inane. Did anyone think all Jewish adolescents were angels, such that the existence of a few who are capable of being as assholic as their gentile counterparts blows our tiny minds? If so, I grieve for your disillusionment, but that doesn't make this news.
If you want to meet thoughtful young Israelis or American Jews, you certainly do not go to the midrachov, where this bullshit was filmed. These are just drunk kids from Jersey who have gun-toting Sarah Palin posters on their walls like plenty of other ignorant bored 20 year olds do. There's nothing unique about this situation except where they're sitting while they spout off.
Nice working interviewing a wide range of people, Max. I could walk into any bar in any city in the world and recreate this scene. Fish in a barrel.
My maiden last name was very German, but I am very much a Jew. I do, however, lack the blind spot that many other Jews have when it comes to the subject of Israel. In college, all the Jewish kids formed this campus organization to 'support Israel' and plant trees, etc. They were so fanatic about their position: to even suggest to them that a people who had been persecuted should not condone and perpetuate the persecution and subordination of another people on the basis of religion or ethnicity, you would have thought I had suggested that we go kick puppies and then go out for lobster and ham, their reaction was so over-the-top. Yet, for all their supposed allegiance to Israel, not a single Gator for Israel that I ever talked to would actually go over to Israel and join their military. Thank goodness I married a gentile, otherwise I might have to hear a bunch of pro-Israel jingoism talk over gefilte fish until I lost my will to live. Some of the most racist supremacists that you will ever meet are Jewish. I would like to go on record and speak for the more rational Jews, and also for political science majors who know who Benjamin Netanyahu is.
@alexadolan: Big tits Goldensteinfarb (or whatever her name is) is like every fatty I went to Hebrew School with. I used to wonder what all the other girls ate, because they all have huge boobies and the most un-toned flaptastical arms from age 10 and up. All she needs is her diet coke and white Louis Vuitton purse with rainbow lettering to really round the scene out. Am I the only Jewish girl who hates diet coke, and would not buy a LV purse if you paid me?
@The One: I am probably more Jewish then you. Did you read both your torah and haftorah in Hebrew at your Bar Mitzvah? I bet not. I am not converting to anything else, and I won't raise my daughter as anything else. However, I don't think that being devoted to your religion means that you should condone what Israel does in the name of preserving statehood. I am not saying that Palestine is right, only that Israel's actions should represent that ideals of our religion. Saying that Israel's actions have been wrong does not make Palestine right. This isn't a zero-sum game we're playing. Jewish girls do love diet coke...fact. Ask my sister, she lives on the stuff. Jewish girls do have big boobs, unless you are me. Again, reference sister. We do love bagels, we are good with money. There are historical reasons for this. Bagels we eat because the dough could be boiled, and that cut time that you had to use the more expensive oven. We are good with money because it was one of the few careers we were allowed to have. We charged interest to gentiles, and no interest to each other (per Deuteronomy Chapter 15 Verses 1-4 "At the end of every seven years thou shalt make a release. And this is the manner of the release: Every creditor that lendeth ought unto his neighbour shall release it; he shall not exact it of his neighbour, or of his brother; because it is called the LORD's release.Of a foreigner thou mayest exact it again: but that which is thine with thy brother thine hand shall release;Save when there shall be no poor among you; for the LORD shall greatly bless thee in the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee for an inheritance to possess it"). So, I do poke fun at a racist asshat twatwaffle of a fatty, and that makes me a bigot?
@alexadolan: So, your Jew hatred boils down to your feelings of inadequacy about having a flat chest.
[gawker.com] "Thank goodness I married a gentile" While we Jews are also grateful, we do send our sympathies to the gentiles.
You go beyond mere criticism of Israel (and Jews) and right into Jew-bashing. "Some of the most racist supremacists that you will ever meet are Jewish." That could have been taken verbatim from the Stormfront message boards. They love self-hating Jews.
You didn't just "poke fun" at a racist, but showed your bigotry as well. You are no better than what you criticize.
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The fact that they're Americans reminds me of a friend I had from Liberia (who was black). He said he fucking hated black tourists from the US who kept talking about Liberia and Africa as the "homeland," and how paternalistic they got about this country they'd just arrived in. Whereas white tourists in Liberia knew that they were merely tourists, and consequently comported themselves in such a way that recognized their own otherness. In this video, these kids are assuming a patriotic fervor for a country they're only scratching the surface of, before they go back to their comfy lives in Westchester or Silver Spring. They're just as arrogant and unrealistic as those black tourists to Liberia are, figuring they know best when it comes to a country they don't even know at all.
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Then I actually watched the video. Those dudes cannot possibly be the educated class of Israel. I feel a little bad that I can't feel genuine horror, as much as amused disregard.
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1) I didn't know that pointing to the racism of other people made one an anti-semite. But, apparently under some conditions, that is the case. Good to know.
2) Likewise I didn't know that pointing a camera at a bunch of drunken assholes and asking their opinion about the President and his policy toward one country made one a self-hating Jew and an anti-semite. I shall alert my friends.
3) I really need to know what specific brands of alcohol (and/or drugs) cause one to talk about niggers and faggots, advocate the assassination of a sitting president, etc. You might also want to pry these magical elixirs from the hands of these kids' parents, because these are learned attitudes.
4) Okay, so you convinced me, I don't really give a shit about dual citizenship. What I would like, however, and what I haven't had in my lifetime, is a foreign policy in the middle east that puts the United States' interests first. Maybe we'll get it now (although until yesterday, nothing Obama ever said made me think this was the case).
5) When I suggested that these kids should have to choose their citizenship, I never imagined for a second that they would choose the Israeli option. I don't blame them; and no matter, we share our country with all manner of cretins...even ones from Crete.
6) The accusation of anti-semitism is ridiculously overused. Quick quiz: who are the other "Semites" in the region? Quick answer: the Arabs. But you know an Internet discussion has lost its intellectual spark when the old saw comes out.
06/05/09
"Perhaps a missile attack was an over-reaction on Israel's part."
"From what page of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion did you pull that from?!?!?!"
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They're negative behavior would immediately attributed to an entire race or group of people.
I can appreciate that these jerks in the video are not representative of every single person who happens to be Jewish. I doubt many, many of these same posters would agree and come to the defense of the kids if they were from Queens or Pilsen or East LA, Youngstown, Ohio, or Iran.
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There are a lot of obstacles on the path between those two points -- or so one hopes -- and three rounds of drinks don't suddenly enable one to make the whole journey in one night. In fact I'd suggest it takes years of training.
That's what's so unsettling about this video, even if the words wind up being completely empty: That these kids posit the existence of a community where saying such things out loud isn't the social equivalent of immediately dunking yourself in shit and being set on fire.
For some groups, we think we know why they say such things and where their ideas come from. For this group, however, the sources of their behavior are somewhat less clear to many of us, and that's why it's unsettling.
To anyone has a handle on why these kids think it's OK to act this way: I understand why your reaction is "Come on, it's not that big a deal, it's really no different than any other group of kids who would say such things. You're blowing it out of proportion." I think you're probably right. I just suggest that we who are stunned by this are stunned because we're confused and unsettled, not because we think these kids are representative of anyone but themselves and the (hopefully imaginary) community where they think such utterances are fair game.
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People should accept that racism is everywhere and the stereotype that it's a Southern product needs to be packed up.
As for this video, freedom of speech is something many people embrace until they hear something they don't like. Then they become repressive tyrants.
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Way to throw the door open to antisemites. No, I'm not talking about people who are critical of Israel, as they should be. I mean not asshats who say things like "We should all just feel so blessed for the eternal gift Judaism -- who knew that an ancient dogma dogma rooted in self-obsession and exploitation would lead to such nuanced and intelligent behavior?"
Or "The funny thing about these people is they have no problem invoking the Holocaust." Yes, Gawker, you encourage these troll jackasses, and their sentiments will now be embraced by your servers forever.
How is it that this site can find douchebags anywhere -- heck, that's what it does best -- but only manages to generalize them all as something like "The Young Jews" in, oh, certain cases?
This sort of thing came up throughout the election, when Jews as a whole were constantly being "jokingly" ridiculed on this site as Obama-hating racists. The fact is, and remains, that 78 percent of American Jews voted for Obama, versus 43 percent of whites in general. 78 percent. But you find a few racist douchenozzles getting drunk and and mouthing off in a disgusting manner, and suddenly "The Young Jews Are Not Fans of Obama."
Fuck these assholes? Yes, I agree. But fuck you, too, Gawker. Just fuck you.
06/05/09
I think everyone -- even the lurking anti-semites, who I can't deny are probably out there somewhere -- recognizes this behavior for what it is: extremely poor judgment by folks who aren't operating at their highest level. We've all seen that happen in our own lives, multiple times in fact, and we're just thankful there weren't cameras around then.
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And the commenter who made that "eternal gift" comment...I just banned him about 5 minutes ago as I made my way through this thread. First one ever and certainly very deserved.
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I'm not sure it does, actually -- I find an assertion like "X begs the question" hard to interpret.
But here's my attempt anyway: Such overt expressions of racism are worth shining a light on, and denouncing, in contexts where they're not already cliches.
I'd say that among groups of Americans abroad, this behavior is not a cliche and thus is pretty shocking. In the expatriate groups I've encountered, there might be one or two loudmouths willing to utter such sentiments, but they know that they're acting against group norms and usually wind up acknowledging that social pressure.
That's my brief attempt to describe why this video feels sui generis and shocking enough to be of note -- which could be the "why" you asked about.
Possibly you could counter me by arguing that these kids' shocking utterances don't really have any content and aren't even "meant" in any significant sense. I'd listen to that argument, if you thought you had some insight into what makes these kids act this way. On that topic, I've got nothing.
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Yep.
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But I have felt for a long time that Gawker has a thing about "The Jews" -- something that may seem intended as sophisticated mockery against a group that can take it, but happens so often that it seems generally meanspirited and to come from a bad place. And the reappearance of genuinely bigoted trolls is an indication that they're going to a bad place, too.
Usually when I see these posts I just tell myself to shut up and move on, but the headline on this post (which was by no means the worst of the genre) just got to me. And I appreciate you changing it.
I do think the meme Gawker ran with throughout the election period, of "old Jews / young Jews / all Jews hate Obama because they're secret racists and because he might not love Israel enough, and those Jews maybe have too much power and could ruin the 'hope and change' thing for the rest of us," is not just hateful but untrue, and has to stop. I mean, 78 percent support. Sheesh.
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It seems to me, and the original headline and the overhyped rhetoric of the journalist who shot the video would seem to support this, that what supposedly made this so shocking is that these are Jewish kids in Israel. That's pretty much it. Otherwise it's just a bunch of stupid college kids ranting, which would hardly seem to merit that much attention. Maybe they're representative of a much larger group, but this video does nothing to demonstrate that -- it's eight people, most of whom seem to know one another, but suddenly we're supposed to be outraged and horrified by what they say because -- why? Sure, they're saying stupid obnoxious things, but after everything that was seen in the last election, are we really surprised by seeing obviously stupid people say obnoxious things about Obama? When they're drunk? Really?
This just seems like an utter non-event to me that got attention solely due to the religion/ethnicity of the people who said it. It's the crappiest kind of bogus trend-story reporting. I could see posting it to make fun of the original poster before being shocked and outraged by the content.
I mean, if this is that newsworthy, I think Gawker should also be trawling Youtube on a weekly basis to post the best of morons on the Internet.
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Nice working interviewing a wide range of people, Max. I could walk into any bar in any city in the world and recreate this scene. Fish in a barrel.
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C'mon, "ANY bar in ANY city in the WORLD"???
Care to put money on that? I could use the cash.
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[gawker.com] "Thank goodness I married a gentile" While we Jews are also grateful, we do send our sympathies to the gentiles.
You go beyond mere criticism of Israel (and Jews) and right into Jew-bashing. "Some of the most racist supremacists that you will ever meet are Jewish." That could have been taken verbatim from the Stormfront message boards. They love self-hating Jews.
You didn't just "poke fun" at a racist, but showed your bigotry as well. You are no better than what you criticize.